The Mechanics of MMA’s Improvement

As the MMA community approaches a manufactured if helpful sign post
in UFC 100 this weekend, both fans and pundits alike have been
reciting the origins and significant moments in the sport’s brief
history. A common meme that seems to consistently ascend over the
others in the course of conversation has appeared, dealing with the
“growth of the sport.”

One often hears “huge” or how “large” MMA has become. And why
wouldn’t you? Everything is bigger. The purses are larger, the
crowds have swollen, the divisions are deeper, the territory of
fertile MMA land has expanded and the number of competitors has
exploded. Clearly, MMA is bigger now than it once was.

The problem? Growth isn’t MMA’s only story.

The notion of improvement is an equally important angle to the
development of the UFC and MMA over the last 15 years. We need look
no further than the UFC 100 card for evidence of it.

The UFC 100 event may not even be the most significant of the
summer, but in terms of what the arrangement and composition of the
card tells us about where the sport precisely is amidst the change
it has experienced, the card is strangely informative. Like an
archaeologist examining an artifact to determine its origin and
what those origins mean, examining the UFC 100 card allows us to
reflect on the changes to the sport besides pure
aggrandizement.

From a macro perspective, the UFC 100 card tells us the sport has
critical albeit informal support structures and systems that are
fundamentally part of and necessary for success. Over the course of
its existence, MMA has consistently and thoroughly systematized and
organized itself. This evolution has helped improve performance and
product while making tasks more efficient, simple and
deliverable.

These informal but necessary systems and support structures sound
vague, but the truth is there are examples all around us. In fact,
the UFC 100 fight card sheds light on a number of these hugely
important but often invisible arrangements.

Let’s leave aside the issue of the fight card being an organizing
component that itself has undergone its own process of improvement.
Let’s look at the fighters on the card.

What we can clearly see is there are (and to varying degrees have
existed for quite some time) now informal systems for prospective
talent to be fed into the professional circuit. Specifically,
competitive wrestlers have carved out a special niche. Former elite
wrestlers like Mark Coleman,
Dan
Henderson, Matt Grice
and CB
Dollaway remind us that there are clear channels and entry
points for former wrestling competitors to try their hand at
competition under watchful eye and guidance at gyms and fight
camps. The success and size of the operation speaks for itself.

Photo by Sherdog.com

Bisping is proof of
action.

Gyms and fight camps, of course, are also evidence of MMA’s
self-organization. Aspiring fighters looking to improve their skill
and performance eventually figured out that working in packs (with
some hierarchy) worked wonders. The practice became systemized and
spread like wild fire. In fact, even the packs themselves change
out members and combinations for maximum effect. Fighters like
Georges
St. Pierre -- who consistently works with a steady diet of
reliable regulars and fresh blood -- are a testament to that
success of that development.

Fighters like Jon Jones,
fighting Jake
O’Brien on the UFC 100 undercard, demonstrate there are now
directly employed methods and best practices to grooming budding
talent. Jones may not prefer to fight when no one on television can
see him, but the practice of putting him there against a suitable
opponent that offers the right kind of test at this moment in his
career is a practice borne from experience and now much more widely
used.

The center of the system, the UFC, has also determined and used
novel ways of mining and promoting the next generation of talent
with its vast resources. Fighters like Mac Danzig and
Michael
Bisping -- seasons six and three winners of “The Ultimate
Fighter,” respectively -- as well as Stephan
Bonnar are living proof of the efficacy of the organized,
systemic efforts the UFC has developed to find new talent. Through
a process of recruiting, testing, culling and promoting along with
staggered but organized timing and media campaigns, “The Ultimate
Fighter” is a perfect example of the emergent order Zuffa has
helped create.

The sport (and more approximately the UFC in this case) has also
become much better at discovering and poaching talent from abroad.
Five of the 10 main card competitors at UFC 100 are originally from
other countries. Globalization with its shrinking of distances both
physically and culturally has played a role as well. Korean and
Korean-Japanese fighters Dong Hyun
Kim and Yoshihiro
Akiyama, exceptionally valuable commodities for more local
promotions, are finding greener pastures elsewhere.

Larger than life figures like Brock
Lesnar prove the sport (again, mostly the UFC) has more
effectively determined how to properly promote itself, “properly”
being the key word. Over time, the sport not only expanded efforts
to attract the attention of noteworthy figures beyond the community
but also figured out effective methods of integration.

The reality is this: While the point I’m pushing does not work with
the tidiest of definitions, MMA (or rather the wide network of
communities that comprise the sport) is successful because it has
become a complex adaptive system. It has disparate elements working
together, and the system can change and improve by learning from
one another or an outside source. The UFC 100 card may not
necessarily be the most exemplary in terms of talent or meaningful
fights, but it is a product of its time. I hesitate to call this
the “Golden Era” of MMA, but it is fair to say the current
iteration of the sport is far more advanced and sophisticated in
nearly every conceivable dimension than the iteration we knew 15
years ago. It’s not just a difference in degree; it’s also a
difference in kind.

When we reflect on how MMA or the UFC has changed on the eve of UFC
100, remember “growth” only tells half the story. What’s made that
growth remarkable and so successful is not its sheer size but how
it has been fashioned, molded and refined through many efforts at
self-organization.

The truth is that the engine of progress is self-organization. What
has made MMA and the UFC so special is that from broad vantage
points, one can say both have quite clearly improved. Not just in
the talent of the fighters, but in every way. Yes, the UFC
experienced a clear moment of decline, as did Pride and countless
other leagues. There have been bubbles and there will be more. But
incrementally, the scope and quality of the sport appears to be
improving. As the sport attracts new members to the community, the
existing members have discovered and employed new ways to make the
support structures and the sport itself even better. That’s
progress. We are now at the stage where some of those best
practices aren’t just being used; they’re being spread and made
systemic across the sport.

So, take a second look at the UFC 100 fight card. Look closely and
see what it tells you about where the sport is today and how far it
has come from where it began. That’s when you realize UFC 100 isn’t
a moment to dismiss or undermine. It’s a time to celebrate.